‘Living the Dream’ award given

February 11, 2013

CHARLESTON - Leonard Harris is a Martinsburg businessperson, community leader, and activist. In 2012, Harris and his wife Helen graciously hosted and partnered with Friends of Blackwater's "J.R. Clifford Project" - in the Project's educational work in the Eastern Panhandle.

Leonard Harris was recently honored by the Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday Commission with the Commission's annual "Living the Dream" Award. Harris' award was announced at the King Commission's annual Banquet, held in Charleston, Jan. 12.

Harris is a founder and volunteer director of the Sumner-Ramer African American School Museum, located in Martinburg's historic Ramer Center, where Blackwater Hero J.R. Clifford (1848-1933) was once a school principal.

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Leonard Harris

Clifford, like Harris, was also a Martinsburg businessman. After working as a teacher and school principal, Clifford became a newspaper publisher and then West Virginia's first African American attorney. Clifford brought a famous civil rights legal case in 1894 for an African American Blackwater Canyon/Tucker County schoolteacher, Carrie Williams. Clifford obtained a landmark ruling from the West Virginia Supreme Court that helped protect and promote educational opportunity for African American West Virginians.

The Harrises own the Harris Community Care home care business, located in Martinsburg and Romney. The Harrises were key players in helping the J.R. Clifford Project put on the "A New Home for Liberty" living history drama in October 2012 in Shepherdstown. "Helen's beautiful voice riveted the audience!" said Tom Rodd, the author of "A New Home for Liberty."